Practical information
Most of the recent literature on China"s rise forecasts that the country will sooner or later overtake the U.S. as the world"s superpower. Timothy Beardson explains why this will not happen in his book: Stumbling Giant: the Threats to China"s Future, published in May by the Yale University Press.
After opening up in 1978, China was the world"s fastest reforming country through the 1980s and 1990s. From 2000 reforms stopped. Growth is now slowing. With a declining labor force and later a falling total population, it is hard to see high economic growth after 2030. China now faces a window in which it must radically reform or fall into a “middle income trap,” often seen when a fast-rising economy runs out of steam and it experiences a shrinking ability to bring under-employed people into the economy.
An historian by training and a financier by career, Timothy Beardson has lived in Hong Kong for 35 years and has been engaged with China since 1978. He founded, majority-owned and ran Crosby Financial Holdings (1984-1999), which became the largest independent investment bank in the Far East. Beardson addresses economic and strategic issues at events such as the World Economic Forum at Davos and speaks frequently to governments, universities, boards and central banks on economic and strategic issues. Chairing the China Oxford Scholarship Fund, he is involved with the Chinese education system.
Chair: Françoise Nicolas, Director, Center for Asian Studies Ifri.
Other events
Brussels, Germany, France and Italy Facing the Energy and Industrial Crises: Coordinated or Diverging Trajectories?
Amidst soaring defense spending, higher borrowing costs, erosion of energy intensive industries, renewed energy price hikes and possibly physical shortages, the European Union and its Member States are again struggling to stabilize the European economies. Governments are tempted by uncoordinated, short-term moves while in Brussels, there is a struggle between the “more of the same” and the “scrap it largely” approaches to the transition.
Geopolitical stakes of the New Moon race
As the United States, China, and India solidify their lunar ambitions, Europe is still seeking to define its stance: should it be a reliable partner or an autonomous strategic player? This conference will examine the stakes of this new race to the Moon and Europe’s interest in asserting itself as a lunar power through partnerships, industrial ambitions, and whether its participation in the new lunar race serves as a lever for strategic autonomy and internal cohesion, or an illustration of its dependence.